This watchdog blog, by journalist Norman Oder, offers analysis, commentary, and reportage about the $4.9B project to build the Barclays Center arena and 15-16 towers at a crucial site in Brooklyn. Dubbed Atlantic Yards by developer Forest City Ratner in 2003, it was rebranded Pacific Park Brooklyn in 2014 after the Chinese government-owned Greenland Group bought a 70% stake going forward. As of 2018, after the arena and four towers were built, Greenland owns 95% of future construction.

CB2: BrooklynSpeaks proposal should beef up role of community boards

The recommendations by BrooklynSpeaks for reforming the governance of Atlantic Yards deserve some modification to beef up the role of community boards, according to Shirley McRae, Chairperson of Community Board 2.

Last week, McRae wrote to BrooklynSpeaks' Gib Veconi:The Executive Committee believes that the community boards should have the same relationships to the proposed “Project Oversight Entity” and “Stakeholder Council” as the local elected officials, as diagrammed in Figure 2 of the draft.

[This would mean an extra arrow pointing from the CBs to the oversight entity as well as the stakeholder council. Click to enlarge.]

This comment is not meant to imply that community boards are comparable to elected officials. However, the committee believes that a relationship to both groups most fairly reflects the role of community boards as set forth in the New York City Charter.

Gib Veconi of BrooklynSpeaks, asked for comment, responded, "We're grateful for the feedback we have received from CB2, as well as from other Community Boards, agencies, and elected officials. The BrooklynSpeaks sponsors are working to incorporate the comments into a revised proposal for reform of Atlantic Yards governance."